Thursday, September 03, 2009

Top Quarks

If you haven't been reading Symmetry magazine, you've been missing a lot of fascinating stuff. Even if you're not into particle/high energy physics, you should read it since it often covers more than just that subject area.

An article covering the physics of top quarks caught my eye and, as expected, it is a wonderfully-written piece that most people (i.e. non physicists) can understand. It clearly shows that very important aspect of discovery in physics that I've mentioned several times on here in the context of my criticism against pseudoscience. You will notice that upon the first initial discovery of the top quark many years ago, we not only have verified its existence, but our knowledge of it continues to improve over the years as more and more tests are conducted and better technology evolves. We know more about the top quark now than we did before, and have gone WAAAAAY past the stage where we have to show that it exists. This is an important characteristics of a VALID PHENOMENON that many people do not seem to realize and appreciate.

If you do not know what is considered as a valid phenomenon and what isn't, try applying that rule and see what you get.

Zz.

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